


Over the Love of You

by splashfree



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/M, I Don't Even Know, Spoilers for episode 22, my feels are broken, shameless romantic angst, someone please stop me i've been writing this for over a month
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-03
Updated: 2013-10-03
Packaged: 2017-12-28 06:54:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/989051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/splashfree/pseuds/splashfree
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It’s an exercise in catharsis. Biologically beneficial, as Hanji has explained more than once, but needless to say, it’s not something humanity’s greatest soldier often indulges in."</p>
<p>Even the strongest heroes need a shoulder to cry on. Levi uses Hanji's.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Over the Love of You

**Author's Note:**

> I can't even begin to talk about episodes 21 and 22. So instead I wrote this. It's sobby angst because SNK makes me sobby and angsty. Among other things. Please take it away from me. 
> 
> (seriously though, i have literally no time in my life for anything right now (just moved, am back at school = zero time), so if i don't post this now and at least pretend that it's done (nghfnpthhhbt) i'll never write anything else, fail all my classes and die tragically alone. i guess all those things could still happen, but at least this way i can say i tried, lol)
> 
>  
> 
> **IN BIG BOLD CAPITAL LETTERS: THIS HAS SPOILERS FOR EPISODES 21 AND 22**

 

They’re deluded. Every single one of them.

Those who cheer and those who rage and those who cry. They’re all so misguided, it’s nauseating.

It makes Levi sick.

He is in that separate headspace. Eyes fixed. Body moving resolutely forward. It’s enough and always has been. At least, until Ral starts speaking.

Then the image returns – the crimson sluice, the sunlight dappling a young and upturned face – and Levi wants to snap. Stop and snarl. Call the man a deluded idiot, because he is.

But silence is another language; and as it holds, Petra’s father stops talking. Stops asking. Stops anything at all.

 

 

 

It was an impulse of escapism Levi doesn’t fully regret, despite the fact that his leg is now throbbing and he can’t bend his knee. He should have reported to the medic like Erwin ordered, but when he saw the opportunity for privacy, he took it. Not the wisest move, perhaps, but Levi’s had enough wisdom for one day. If his leg falls off, so be it; in the meantime, he needs a shower.

He sheds his cloak, coat, and cravat, and is in the process of unbuckling the straps across his chest and shoulders when she finds him. Only two knocks and not even the decency to wait for his answer. She’s already in his room, carefully shutting the door behind her.

Her hair’s even more of a mess than usual, frizzed out between the straps of her glasses, and she’s still wearing her dirty, green cloak. Her face is pale from exhaustion, mouth fixed in such an uncharacteristically straight line that Levi wants to give her hell for it. But he can’t. Something else is pushing upwards, threatening to turn him inside out if he so much as utters a word.

Then again, he’s never had to explain himself to Hanji. And he assumes he never will.

She is across the room in three long strides, gathering him into her arms without comment or question. He holds her reflexively, and they are a single mass of joint and muscle, a perfect, unbreakable knot.

It’s an exercise in catharsis. Biologically beneficial, as Hanji has explained more than once, but needless to say, it’s not something humanity’s greatest soldier often indulges in. Levi likes to think he keeps his eyes as clear as possible – that he labors under no delusions when it comes to this dismal reality. But every now and then, survival will take its toll.

This is one such now.

The squall eventually passes, his gasps subside, and he resumes control of his aching body. The track of Hanji’s palm across his back is an idle, soothing metronome, and Levi considers what it would be like to stay like this, against her, for the rest of his laughable existence.

_Boring_ , he decides, and almost smirks. No doubt she’d agree: _“But I can’t do my research if you’re hanging all over me!”_ she’d say reproachfully. _“I appreciate the gesture, Lance Corporal, but don’t you have better things to do?”_

Levi sighs as he pulls away, head oddly buoyant and dull pain erupting behind his heavy eyes. He tugs his shirt collar up to wipe his nose, noting with irritation the disgusting wet patch he left on Hanji’s shoulder.

“I can’t talk to you yet, can I?”

Her voice spills against the side of his head. To her credit, these are the first words she’s spoken since she arrived.

Levi swallows and slowly gathers his shattered composure. “You have something to tell me?”

“Nothing I’ve never said before.”

They deal differently – Hanji through speech and him through silence – and it’s been the task of the century to understand this. To learn to love it.

“Talk,” Levi offers hoarsely. “If you want.” Hanji shakes her head.

“Not what I meant,” she says, and holds him a little tighter. “I’m….” She deliberates, huffs out a sigh. “I’m just glad you’re here, Levi. I’m so glad.”

Levi swallows, heart ratcheting in his chest. He nods. “You too.”

Hanji nods vigorously, squeezing tight before letting go to observe him. Her eyes are red too, pained and determined behind those dopey goggles, which are catching her tears like two tiny fish bowls. Levi coughs with laughter.

“Just look at you,” he says wearily, though he knows he can’t possibly look any better. He tips the rims and wipes saltwater from her cheeks with the back of his hand.

Hanji reaches for his face, frowning as she notices her dirty fingers. For once in his life, Levi doesn’t care – he’d do anything to have her touch him right now – but before he can find the words to say so, her fingers change tracks. Slip behind his ears instead.

Her lips are barely a whisper across his closed lids, but they ripple chills from his neck to his heels. His hands tighten on her hips.

She kisses the bridge of his nose, lightly his dry lips and smiles at him, tired and sad. He should say something.

“They were fine soldiers.” His voice is tiny, artificial. Levi clears his throat, tries again. “The best.” Words are dumb.

Hanji nods softly. “Yeah,” she says. “They were.” Her hands curl over his shoulders. “I’ll miss them.”

Levi nods. He will too, or as close as one can get to missing every single soldier, comrade and friend who has fallen in battle. He’ll remember their names. Their faces. How desolatingly thankful he felt as he ripped the wings from their jackets.

_You gave me everything you had, just as you promised. Now have your true freedom._

“She told her father,” He’s talking again, “she was going to devote herself to me. So he found me today. Ral. Told me –” The rage is sudden and strangling. “Told me she’s too young to get married. Before he looked.” He swallows, lip curling. “Before he even double-checked to see whether or not he still had a daughter.”

Hanji’s eyebrows pinch, gaze flickering darkly. “Would it be horrible,” she says, “to call the grieving father an idiot?”

“It’s probably the nicest thing you could call him.”

Hanji sighs. “He _is_ a civilian, I guess,” she says. “Plus parents are notoriously short-sighted.”

“Says shit-for-eyes herself.” Levi traces his thumb around a lens. “He was right, though.”

“About what?”

“She is too young to get married.” Levi sighs. “Was.”

Petra Ral. Clever, skilled, and the best assist you could ever hope for. Devoted to him? Without a doubt. Maybe too much. Her dedication certainly drove Auruo Bossard to fits of tongue-biting, and not the kind he would have liked either.

Not that any of that mattered now.

“You think?” Hanji says, plucking the buckle loose on his chest. “Old enough to die in battle says old enough to marry in my book.”

“Everyone’s always old enough to die.” Levi shrugs the harness off his shoulders. “Doesn’t matter if you’re in uniform. But you don't get married until you decide you’re not dying anytime soon. And you don’t decide that until you’re old and comfortable. And no one joins the Scouting Legion to feel comfortable. Or grow old.”

Nothing is permanent. Nothing can be taken for granted. He knows this better than most, but as Levi watches Hanji chew on his words, he suddenly feels all sorts of irritated. Irrational.

He grabs a handful of her cape. At first he thinks it might be to undo the button at her shoulder, but as she blinks at him, it becomes clear. He grabs her hair instead.

She lets him kiss her desperately, shamelessly, and Levi is inexpressibly grateful for it. He needs this – dry lips, sour mouths, breathlessness – needs her, needs the way Hanji Zoe’s fingers twist into his belt and the way her tongue slips so easily against his. Maybe it’s to remind himself what living’s like; maybe it’s to distract him from the present; but mostly, it feels like he’s simply _asking_. Begging her.

It’s embarrassing, really.

They part, gasping for breath, clinging to each other for balance. Levi’s head is spinning.

“How many more do we have, Hanji?” he breathes.

“What are you talking about?” Her eyes are hooded, forehead pressed against his.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about. This. How many?”

“Levi.”

“Guess.”

“ _Levi._ ” She’s laughing at him; he can feel it in the hands now cradling his face. Okay, so maybe he _is_ being ridiculous.

“Right.” He forces in a breath and out a sigh. “I’m being stupid.”

“I didn’t say that. But yeah, Rivaille, you are.”

Levi chuckles humorlessly. “Alright. Forget it then.”

Hanji smiles, brushes her nose against his. “You’ll be fine,” she says.

“Oh yeah?” It’s difficult not to kiss her like this, but he manages. “You sound pretty confident.”

“Would you rather I not?”

“I have no fucking clue.”

Hanji laughs, kisses him again. “You’ll be fine,” she repeats. “Or you won’t be. In which case—”

“In which case?”

“You won’t be alone.”

_There._ He feels it scamper across the back of his neck and under the line of her thumb. He swallows.

“And you?” Levi says, voice raspier than he would have liked. Hanji smirks.

“Do you even have to ask, Lance Corporal?”

“Yeah.” His pulse is shuddering. “Maybe I do.”

Hanji pulls back, much to Levi’s consternation, her smile smug. “I’ll be fine too,” she says. “Or I won’t be. In which case….”

Levi numbly unbuttons her cape, pulls it from her shoulders. “Yeah?”

Hanji catches his right hand, presses it over her heart. He can feel it beating strong and steady beneath the embroidered patch.

“In which case,” Hanji says with that foolish little smile, “you _still_ won’t be alone, Levi. So stop worrying.”

It’s difficult to breathe, but Levi lets go all the breath he has anyway, left hand curling into the harness across her shoulder blades. “Who says I’m worrying?” he grumbles weakly, leaning into her again. “Goddammit, Hanji.”

She laughs, strokes his hair. “There, there.” She can be so irritating sometimes.

For a moment they just stand there. His palm is hot against the badge, her hand still steady over his. His leg throbs, and he grips her a little more firmly. She holds him. “I’ll miss this,” he mutters against her neck.

Hanji’s arms tense. “Maybe you won’t have to,” she says.

“Maybe.” Or maybe one day she’ll be another badge in his pocket. Another ghost in his memory. He’ll see the shell she leaves behind – or he won’t – and she’ll be gone. 

And there’s literally nothing he can do to stop it.

“Hanji.” The skin of her neck smells so decidedly like _her_. Like home. “Promise me something.”

“I’ll take your wings.” She almost blurts it, her voice low. Distant. Levi’s eyes close.

“I know that,” he says quietly. That promise remains one of his greatest comforts. “Something else. Promise me.”

“Depends. What is it?”

Levi snorts. Figures. “You’re supposed to say, ‘Of course, I’ll promise,’ not, ‘it depends.’ Shithead.”

Hanji’s laugh vibrates in his chest. “Well I need to know what I’m promising before I promise it! What if it’s something impossible? Or creepy? Or gross? What if you wanted me to stop researching Titans and I –”

“Okay, I get it,” Levi says. “Just shut up. Fuck, you’re horrible at romance.”

“You’re just now getting that?”

Levi snorts again. “Okay fine,” he says. “Evaluate this proposal and get back to me via official memorandum, you fucking killjoy.”

“Shoot.”

So much for preserving the moment. Levi sighs. “I don’t want you to die,” he says flatly. “But everybody dies, so I can’t make you promise not to. All the same, I want you to keep it in mind: know that I don’t want you to die. That your being alive is important. It’s crucial. To me. To humanity too, but fuck it, I’m being a selfish asshole right now. _I_ want you to keep living, Hanji. As long as you can manage it,” Levi swallows. “Do that, and I’ll be grateful to you.”

Maybe it won’t seem like such an important thing to say in a day or two, but right now it needs to be said. Better said than not, anyway.

Hanji listens, and after a few moments pass, Levi kisses her neck. “Alright, I’m done,” he says. “Promise you’ll remember that. That’s what I’m asking. Really nicely. Or should I make it an order so that you’ll _have_ to remember it?”

Hanji sniffs straight into his ear, and Levi startles, preparing some wry comment about Mike before he realizes she’s crying.

_Sobbing._ Quietly.

Levi shifts his arms, hooking his chin against her shoulder as she shakes. Pulls back for a moment to lift her goggles, brush the hair gently from her face, and lightly press the clean edge of his sleeve against her tortured eyes.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for readingggggg
> 
> Title is taken from Florence + The Machine's song off the Gatsby soundtrack.
> 
> (and if you happen to be waiting on an update on my _Free!_ fic, I AM SO SORRYYY i am literally the worst. i just haven't been feeling very inspired lately (despite the phenomenal finale) and i don't want to post just any dumb bullshit, so yeah. i'm still working on it just...slowly.)


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